Monday, November 10, 2008

Revelation- Chapter One

Here we go!
Just to clarify one thing: I am writing down what I find out for myself while doing some research on the internet, but also what I believe the Holy Spirit reveals to me, as I asked Him to counsel me. He usually gets excited when we are hungry to understand God's word!

In the first 3 Verses we read John's introduction, the apostle John. The book, or better letter, is called revelation, because it is the revalation of Jesus! We find a promise bound to this book which I did not find in any other introduction. " God blessed the one who reads...and... all who listen...and obey what it says!" WOW! So we better read it carefully so we can understand and obey His word! AMEN?!
John goes on in his greeting to the seven churches of the province Asia, West Turkey today. Why seven? The number seven is the number of completion and perfection in the bible, also called the holy number, which indicates to us, in this context, that this letter was written to all the churches, not only the seven at that time. It is relevant to us as the body of Christ, HIS church!
Paul says in 1. Corinthians 12 there is only ONE body of Christ, we better keep that in mind! Only ONE bride!
As we read on John describes Jesus, the One who is, who always was and who is still to come! This confirms what, again, the apostle Paul wrote in Colossians 1, 15-18. God created everything in and through Jesus! He truly is the Son of God! HE rose from the dead, the first to do so, and rules over everything!
Quite good to know that, especially if you read on and find out that He loves us and freed us from our sins by shedding His blood for us!! It says SINS!!!Plural! All sins we ever comitted and we are going to commit are washed away by HIS blood! We better praise Him for doing that and paying the price for us!
And it goes on! Verse 6:" He has made us a kingdom of priests for God His father!"
Can you see this? Has made, that means already!! We are righteous before Him through Jesus our righteousness! " All glory and power to Him forever and ever! AMEN!"
Verse 7 tells us how he his going to come back to earth one day:" Look! He comes with clouds of heaven. And everyone will see Him- even those who pierced Him. And all the nations of the world will mourn for him. Yes! AMEN!"
I never understood this statement. Why are we going to mourn for him? Another translation says: Mourn because of Him! But why?
Recently I heard somebody speak about this verse and he said that we will mourn because that day we will find out that Jesus is actually much better and greater than we ever thought He would be! WOW again!
In verse 8 Jesus describes Himself, the Alpha and Omega, beginning and the end, the one who is, alsways was and is to come- the Almighty One! This seems to be important to John that we get that, as it is the second time he mentions it in this chapter( see above)!
John then describes the circumstances in which he got the vison. I love it! On a Sunday in exile worshipping in the Spirit! Cool!
A voice commands him to write everything down and when he turns around he sees Jesus standing in the midst of seven lampstands which, as we find out later, represent the seven churches. Jesus right where HE should be, in the centre of His church!
The apostle describes Him in such a majestic way, man, this is the Son of God!
Jesus is girded with a golden band around His chest. Gold stands for majestic, brilliance and splendour! Just the right colour for the King of Kings! He has white hair! White stands for purity and righteousness! Eyes like fire! For me that means full of passion! That can obviously be negative and positive but in this case positive as it is Jesus, who is passionate towards His bride!
A voice like mighty oceans, so full and beautiful! And a sharp two-edged sword came out of His mouth! The word of God is like a sword that defines what is the truth!
Just keep in mind that John always wrote "like" ! He used metaphors to try to explain the majesty of Jesus. The reason for that I believe is simply that there are no words on earth that could ever describe His majesty! This is GOD we are talking about!
John fell at His feet and what does Jesus say? Exactly what He told His diciples all the time:" Don't be afraid! I am the First and the Last!" He says that He is alive forever and ever and that He holds the keys of death and the grave. A key is a powerful tool as it gives you the power to open or close doors and locks! In this case we can see that Jesus truly has all the power, even over death since the day He defeated death on the cross. He goes on and explains to John the seven stars He is holding in His hands and the seven lampstands! Again we find the number seven, the number of completion. The stars represent the angels or spirits of the seven churches which are again symbolised through the seven lampstands. What an introduction to this book!

For me the main thing that stands out in this chapter is Jesus as the core and centre of His church!
If we replace Him with our vision or other things we rob the King of Kings of His righteous place!
May we make Him the centre of who we are and what we do so everything else will fall in place!

Be blessed!

Kirsten, woman of God

1 Comments:

At 1:52 am , Blogger oscar said...

Hey Lovey, hope u enjoying african sun,, you belong there, stay blessed and favored, miss u though, xx

 

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